


We ain't gonna hide

by AgapantoBlu



Series: There's a monster in my mirror [3]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Galra Keith (Voltron), Gen, POV Second Person, Returning Home, Self-Acceptance, Shiro has been arrested by the Garrison and Keith ain't coping, Touch one (1) Paladin and get mauled by the Pride, Trust Issues, song-fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-12
Updated: 2018-04-12
Packaged: 2019-04-21 22:14:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14294607
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AgapantoBlu/pseuds/AgapantoBlu
Summary: You can almost hear Lance’s voice calling you a crazy conspiracy theorist in your head. Your hands twitch on the wires you’re trying to connect, and for a moment you hesitate, because getting caught with this means risking even those few precious moments of monitored chats with the others.How ironic, that before Voltron you could live all alone in the desert and not minding it much, and now the only thought of being forbidden that little share of your friends makes your heart jump and your hands go clammy.-Oh, 'cause I don't need to lie to you,you’ll never break my heart;yeah, you'll find the truth here in my arms.(Adam Lambert ft. Tove Lo - "Rumors")





	We ain't gonna hide

**Author's Note:**

> "Just a few one-shots, Agap, what could it take? Just a handful of short little things!" Past Me is a fucking fraud and a con artist.
> 
> This is long and confused, which is 50% me because I'm actually very short but also very confused right now.

 

 

**_I guess we're in deep, I guess we got higher.  
You'll never believe what I heard on the wire._  **

 

 

Once upon a time, you believed the orange and grey of the Garrison’s uniforms, and looked in awe at the golden pins on your father’s dresser. He would sometimes allow you to touch them, and you would do so with all the reverence you could at five years of life. You would listen to the stories about a mother you couldn’t remember, and you would play pilot on your dad’s shoulders. 

You've long since stopped being so naïve.

The radio you hacked after the failing of the Kerberos mission is a pathetic piece of crap when compared to what Pidge could do with an old mp3 and a pasta colander. You think it might be partially because of her Italian heritage, but it doesn’t matter. You have been allowed to call Hunk last night, so your phone will not let through any call to the other Paladins for another three days at best.

_It’s for your well-being_ , professor Montgomery told you as he walked you to your father’s arms after the last of your sessions. Back then, you’d wondered how you’d never known he was a therapist; now, you wonder how you could really believe him to be one.  _You’ve grown too codependent while in space. It happens. You just need a little time away from the other kids to regain your balance, and then you’ll be allowed to meet again._

What a convenient excuse to put your phones under surveillance.

You can almost hear Lance’s voice calling you a  _crazy conspiracy theorist_ in your head. Your hands twitch on the wires you’re trying to connect, and for a moment you hesitate, because getting caught with this means risking even those few precious moments of monitored chat with the others.

How ironic, that before Voltron you could live all alone in the desert and not minding it much, and now the only thought of being forbidden that little share of your friends makes your heart jump and your hands go clammy. Fear is not something you’re new to, neither are abandonment issues, but this level of hysterics is absurd. Maybe they are right?, maybe you’re too attached to the others and this is really just the only way to help you?

Your hands twitch again, the wires make contact for a moment and a voice sparks through the holes of your old-ass radio. You only catch one word in that split-second of mistake, but it’s enough.

They say  _Galra_ , the same way you used to before finding out about the Blades. Before finding out about  _yourself_.

Mentally, you apologize to Krolia. Your mother is inside the shack with your father, talking about who knows what that they clearly didn’t want you to hear, but it’s fine. You’re not sure they’d approve of your activity, so you gladly took the chance to hide into the cave where you first found Blue and attach your old stuff to a balmeran crystal to try and focus any residual energy into powering up your homemade spying device — Pidge would either be proud of you or have an aneurysm over how little you know about whatever you’re doing —.

If they catch you here, well,  _quiznack_.

 

**_I know it ain't right, it's getting so tired._ **  
**_If we put up a fight, we'll be fueling the fire._ **

 

Krolia is a better cook than your father ever were, and that’s saying something considering she literally comes from so many solar systems away. You slip for a moment, you think about how Hunk would have made this soup a bit more spicy to appease Lance’s need for magmatic chili, and that’s enough to make you lose all your appetite. 

You know your parents are looking at each others from opposite sides of the table. It pisses you off.

“Stop doing that,” you hiss, but all you get is your mom looking at your dad with a confused expression. He sighs.

“Keith, you haven’t been eating much lately,” he starts, and you know he’s worried, you do. Shiro used to have that same expression whenever you skipped a meal at the castle.

_Shiro._

“Why are they taking so long?” You don’t want to specify what you’re talking about, because you know you don’t need to and if they’ll make you it will be because they are  _lying_. 

Their situation might have been unique, but it can’t take a military court this long to deliberate over the actions of a single pilot, one who’s helped saving their planet and multiple others. Shiro is a  _hero_. The whole universe knows that, except for the Galaxy Garrison, apparently.

Krolia sets her cutlery down. She opens her mouth, but not a sound comes out of her lips. Instead, she sighs and shakes her head and gets up to go to bed.

You gave her your room. You could share the living room with your dad, but you’re not sure your parents could sleep in the same room as of now. You don’t really get much of it, but that’s how you feel about most adults. Well,  _real_ adults.

You know you’re past eighteen, past nineteen, closing in on twenty or twenty-one. You’re not sure, it’s getting blurred again now that you’re in the desert. You remember how shocking it was to find out you’d been gone for years, when you all came back, but you don’t feel like an adult. You feel like going to the rec room, plop yourself down on a couch and wait for Lance to come bug you, Hunk to show off his new synthetic pop-corns and Pidge to attach her stupid video-game to the console so you can all take turns to play until Shiro comes herding you all to your rooms to sleep.

That’s not very adult-like.

Alone with your father, the silence is deafening. You can’t take it so you say, “They’re not going to convict him, right? It’s all bullshit. Shiro was just as stuck in the situation as any of us.”

“Shiro is a pilot of the Garrison and he was the only adult there,” your father says, calmly, or as calmly as he can with the dull shadow in his eyes that he has gained ever since you’ve been back. “You were all minors, you can’t be prosecuted for whatever happened.”

“There’s nothing to be prosecuted over!” you hiss, and you don’t know why you’re keeping your voice down, except you do, you just refuse to give in to your paranoia because nobody is spying you, nobody is  _spying you, nobody is spying you_. “And why didn’t they ask for our versions of the events?! We’re not even minors anymore!"

You don’t get it. Something is off and you can’t put your finger on what exactly and you could pick it out if only you could talk with the others but you  _can’t_. You can hear from Hunk, Lance and Pidge weekly, only one at time so from each every three weeks; but it’s been four months since you last heard from Shiro. It’s going to make you go insane.

Your father looks at you one moment longer, and then he shakes his head too. Just like your mother, he never answers you.

The bowl of soup smashes against the wall, but you can’t bring yourself to feel bad about it.

**_'Cause now all the things that we said and done,_ **  
**_twisted around, turned 'em wrong._ **  
**_Feels like all the love is gone._ **  
**_(We lost it)_ **

 

You sneak out early with the pretense of being mad still, and you go back to Blue’s cave. You brush your fingers on the drawings on the walls, almost hope to see them come to life, for Blue’s roar to call you, even if you’ve never piloted her. Lance says she’s a sweet girl with a penchant for purrs and dramatics, which quite explains how she took a liking to him first and foremost. 

Nothing happens, obviously. Blue is in space, in the Castle of Lions, for Allura to protect and care for. 

Black is with the Blades, which is as good as saying you don’t have the slightest idea of where she might actually be. A space pocket?, in between two black-holes? She’s definitely the most protected and well hidden of the Lions, that’s for sure, and you’re glad, even if you miss her. You kinda miss Red too, that temperamental little brat, but you know she’s safe and probably also pissed right now. Lance hid her in the depths of the waters on the mermaids’ planet that he and Hunk saved, under Queen Laxia’s protection, where nobody will think to look for the lion of fire. 

You don’t envy the poor devil who’ll have to fish her out of there and convince her to get over whatever temper tantrum she’ll throw after.

(You half fear and half crave the reality in which that poor devil is Lance himself, and not a future new Paladin.)

The radio in your hands buzzes back to life under your careless ministrations and this time you plug your phone in, run an old vocal message you kept saved and let the thing do its trick, skipping over students’ and teachers’ voices to tune on the one you’re specifically looking for.

Finally, “ _Yes, the prosthetic is Galran, but w_ _ith all due respect, sir, it certainly wasn’t given to me out of goodness of heart! They cut my arm off! The prosthetic was just because they wanted me to keep fighting for them!_ _”_

Horribly, “ _So_ _you admit to fighting for the Galra Empire in their latest war against the universe?_ ”

 

**_We get stuck up inside our heads,_**  
**_talk shit 'til we're walking dead, talk shit 'til we're walking dead_**  
**_(dead dead)_**  

 

“ _What?! That’s not what I—_ “ 

“ _It is exactly what you said, Lieutenant Shirogane._ ”

“ _I was used as a mean of entertainment in gladiators fights! I didn’t fight for the Empire!_ ”

“ _According to our reports, you did, after alleged Emperor Zarkon was succeeded by alleged Emperor Lotor._ ”

“ _No, that’s—_ “

“ _Are you saying your companions lied in their reports? I warn you,_ _Lieutenant_ _Shirogane, if this is the case, this court will have to have them all summoned and interrogated until we shed light on the matter.—_ ”

“ _If only you’d let me—"_

“— _Were it to be found that they have lied in their reports, those of them who are of legal age will be prosecuted for false testimony._ ” 

“ _… What is this really about?_ ”

“ _About whether your conduct got four underage kids involved into a potentially deadly situation out of your personal carelessness._ ”

“ _No, that’s not it. You’re threatening to drag them into this, so what do you really want? I’ve told you everything that happened._ ”

“ _You’re here to answer questions,_ _Lieutenant_ _, not to pose any. Have you or have you not fought in the name of alleged Emperor Lotor?_ ”

“ _Voltron and the coalition made an alliance with him._ ”

“ _Yes or no, cadet._ "

“ _Yes._ ”

“ _Are you aware this actions are an act of treason against Earth?_ ”

“ _Earth was not involved—"_

“ _Two scientists and four children besides you have been imprisoned and, or, injured by the Galra. Earth was definitely involved._ ” 

“ _Clearly not enough to do anything beyond declaring us all dead and cover up everything regarding our disappearances!_ ”

“ _Enough. The defendant is hostile to the court, escort him back to his cell. The trial will resume tomorrow._ ”

You can’t really believe what you heard until well past the moment Shiro’s voice turns into a frustrated scream before falling into complete silence. For a moment, you almost call out to him, but you bit your lips just in time. He can’t hear you anyway, so you turn the radio off and place it down, before grabbing a stone and throwing that instead. 

It bounces placidly on the sand many feet from you, indifferent to your rage. You don’t feel better.

You're panting. You're drowning.

 

**_Why do we care about the rumors, baby?_ **  
**_Yeah, why do we care about the rumors, baby?_ **

Your father wants you to go with him into town, to help him with groceries. You want to go; you have your share of the money Allura gave you all for emergency before letting you back on Earth and it should be enough to let you buy a stupid cheap phone to call your friends without being cut off. At the same time, though, something is making you feel uneasy.

You frown when you realize what it is. Your mom is watching you from inside the house, not even a toe passing the doorstep. It’s weird, because she’s clearly trying you listen to your discussion, but it can’t be easy when your dad is already on the hoverbike and you’re just beside him. Why doesn’t she just come closer? Why—

_It can’t be_ , you think immediately, but a voice in your head says it can, it absolutely can.

“Mom?"

She cowers inside just a little bit more. It breaks you.

You’re acting before you can even begin to think. Your father calls your name behind you but you can’t give a shit, and you just run and grab her arm and pull. 

She pulls back just as hard. ”Keith, don’t!”

“Come out!” Krolia is a warrior, a rebel, the fierceness of a controlled flame; she’s not  _anybody’s,_  not even your dad’s or yours. “Come out of there!”

A yank rips her limb out of your grip and you stumble on the floor. Your head blanks in a white light for a moment as pain pulses in the back of your nape, but you can’t have blackened out for long because when you force your eyes open again your mother is still looking at you in abject horror. Your father’s hands are on your shoulders and you push them off because they’re chocking the air out of you. 

“You’re a prisoner,” you say, and it’s meant to hurt, to poison and burn and corrode, because that’s how you feel right now. Betrayed, foul, tricked, they made you a villain when you were supposed to be a hero. “You can’t walk out even if you wanted to.” 

“I  _could,_ ” she says, just a hint of her usual fight showing in the flash of her fangs, fast coming and fast vanishing. “But I won’t.”

“Why?!” It makes no sense, and your voice is a whine because you still can’t bring yourself to yell, because what if they’re spying on you, spying  _on you, nobody’s spying on you, stop being so paranoid!_

“Keith.” She won’t talk to you, but her eyes are firm and unwavering; for whatever reason she made this choice, she’s sure it’s the best one. It’s your dad’s voice that reaches you from behind, together with the hand that grips your shoulder in a manner that leaves little room for argument. “Let’s go to town.”

An hysteric laugh bubbles in your throat, but you push it down. Your dad seems suddenly oh-so-preoccupied with his really important groceries.

You want to say  _fuck you_ , but you don’t. You want to hate them and stop talking to them, but you know you won’t.

You want a fucking phone to call your family,  _your other family, the one that doesn’t stab you in the back but fights by your side, again and again, and believes in you even when you don’t_. So you get up and go back to the hover-bike. 

 

**_Oh, 'cause I don't need to lie to you,_ **  
**_you’ll never break my heart;_ **  
**_yeah, you'll find the truth here in my arms._ **  
**_So, can you tell me why do we care about the rumors, baby?_ **

 

You’re three miles from the shack when your father activates the microphones of your helmets, so you can talk above the sound of the engine. 

The plan you devised is simple: give him the silent treatment until you can run away at the market, buy the phone and then hide somewhere to call someone,  _anyone, anyone, Hunk, Pidge, Lance_ , probably you’ll call Lance, because he’s the least likely to scold you for getting your hands on a burner phone when the Garrison is watching you.

Your father says, “They’re watching us,” though, and your plan goes straight out of the window. Well, the first part, at least.

“The Garrison?” but you know it. Your dad knows you know and he doesn’t really answer you.

“They can’t know your mother is here, Keith. She’s Galra and that’s all they need to know to take her.”

Well, duh. It’s not like you needed it spelled to you. You just want to know why does it mean she’s confined within the walls of your house. And you feel a little hint of smugness against your imaginary Lance who’d called you a conspiracy theorist the other day. 

Your father takes a turn just a little bit too sharply and you hold on tighter. “They’re not going to let Shiro go, Keith.”

Your heart turns to stone and drops in the middle of a beat, a dead weight in your chest. You’d be lying if you were to say you hadn’t thought about it, you hadn’t considered the option, but somehow that scenario held all the film of falsity of a worst-case, of a child’s nightmare. You knew they technically could, but—indeed, how could they?

The engine roars loud enough to cover your words and you’re running a few miles above the limit, now, and you wonder how much do you really need groceries and how much, instead, you need  _privacy_. “What do they want?”

Your father pushes just a bit more on the accelerator. “You’re smarter than that, Keith. Think harder.”

_Wisdom or death_. You’ve never fared well on the wisdom side of the Blades’ mantra, much to Kolivan’s anguish. Much to  _everybody’s_  anguish, you’ve always been more inclined for shit that brought you much closer to the other end of the sentence.

Still, you know a piece is missing. They took Shiro and got rid of all of you. If they wanted the truth, they’d have kept you. If they wanted the Lions, well, though luck, you came back to Earth on a normal pod. What else? What does Shiro have that all of you don’t?

The moment it hits you, you feel like an idiot.

 

**_The envy runs deep, the jealousy down low;  
it's easy to see, but it's harder to let go._ **

You blame it on the years waking up to find Shiro already in the middle of some kind of work out, or with a vacant stare that kept hold of him the whole day. You blame it on the horror stories that filtered through the mind-meld of the paladins bond, on the thankfully brief experiences you yourself and the others have gone through.

Since the very first day, you’ve been thinking about it as something negative to tiptoe around with Shiro, not as an  _enhancement_.

The blood drains from your face as you whisper, so low you’re not even sure the microphone can pick it: “The arm.”

“The  _weapon_ ,” your father corrects you, voice cold. “The technology that’s in it.”

_The war power_ , he doesn’t say, but you hear anyway. The Galaxy Garrison is the most advanced outpost in the matter of space explorations, scientists come from all over the world to work there, and they are, albeit not to the knowledge of public, the first governative agency to make contact with aliens.

It is just common sense to realize that human weapons have nothing on alien technology. Even without the academical advance of Altea, the Galra are so much superior to Earthlings. Which means the military would do anything to get more intel on their enemies, to try and figure out something to repel an attack.

“Voltron—"

“Voltron is sentient in itself, or at least the lions are,” your father interrupts you. “They can’t be controlled by any government, it’s not their purpose and they won’t allow it. The Garrison won’t rely on a machine they can’t even pick the pilot for. It’s why they got the monopoly on the training of astronauts and pilots so many decades ago."

“While the arm is controlled fully by Shiro’s will,” and suddenly comes a flash, of Haggar standing over Shiro, laughing, preening, calling research what was nothing but torture.

You should have known when you saved Shiro from that table in the desert, after he came back the first time, that the Garrison and the Druids are not much different.

Another thought occurs to you, one that makes you shiver so hard you jerk against your father’s back. “The arm is attached to Shiro’s nerves. It can’t be removed…"

“Yeah, well.” Your father stops. You watch him think for a moment though you can’t see his face through the helmet, until he sighs. “They’ll find a way.”

You want to puke.

 

**_We ain't gonna hide (we ain't gonna hide),_ **   
**_we know what they don't know._  **   
**_A hell of a ride, I swear I'll hold you close._  **

You don’t bother hiding your plan to your father, after that. You think for a good third of the ride, and come to the conclusion that your mother is on Earth for a reason, your father knows too much to be indifferent to the matter, and if you’re really so easily controlled you’ll need help. 

He sends you to a shop of electronics to get him a few pieces for the TV he’s trying to fix. That the man behind the counters sells you a burner phone underhandedly is just an added perk that won’t figure anywhere on your father’s credit card.

There’s a steak-house at the corner of Third and Boulevard. Your dad and you go there, have lunch and talk about stuff. You relay a couple anecdotes carefully editing anything space-y out of the story and your father laughs when he hears of a malfunction making  _the Garrison simulator_ try to kill you. You finish, you pay the bill, you get back home. 

It’s empty when you arrive and you see your father’s shoulders tense for a moment. He knocks on the door four times, then one more after a slightly longer pause. A wooden board on the floor moves, then another and a third and finally your mother pulls herself up from a hole under the pavement. 

You check it. It’s barely big enough to hold her; Hunk wouldn’t fit in, probably neither Shiro. Lance maybe, if he curled his stupidly long legs. It makes you feel claustrophobic just by sight.

She looks at your dad, face serious. “They came and searched the house less than ten minutes after you left.”

He doesn’t look as surprised as you feel when you ask, “What were they looking for?”

“Your blood tests have always been slightly off,” he says. “They probably have a better idea of what could be the reason now.”

Bile rises in your throat. “There’s nothing that proves I’m anything but human, here.”

“They had to check,” Krolia interjects, then frowns. “Something is happening. It’s the first time they break in.” 

The phone in your pocket is a scorching hot point that focuses all your attention, caters to all your nerves, erases every other thought. You look at your father and he nods. “Wherever it is that you’ve been going, they have no idea of what you do there so it’s probably obscured, somehow. Go.”

So off you go, to the nest of a giant lion robot. 

 

_**'Cause now all the things that we said and done,** _  
_**twisted around, turned 'em wrong.** _  
_**Feels like all the love is gone.** _  
_**(We lost it)** _

 

You wish you could call Shiro or Kolivan, because they always know what to do better than you. Allura is a diplomat so she could help too, but you somehow doubt your burner can get a call through the universe. It’s down to the other Paladins, and you need to think because you have one call only. Your phone may be untraced, but the others’ aren’t and if the same number calls two or three of them the Garrison will know.  

Pidge would be the best choice, hacker as she is, but there’s the little problem of her dad living within the Garrison and her being over so often to meet him. You call her when she’s inside, you fuck up your only chance. So, no Pidge.

You called Hunk two days ago as planned, so you know he’s still in the Samoa islands. If he were to receive a weird call and suddenly take a plane to the States, they’d be on his trails immediately.

Lance went back to Cuba, but last time you heard of him, he was planning on coming to the States to visit his older brother Marco, who still lives here, for a bonding car trip. You’re not sure how much Lance could do except help you barge in guns blazing — which is still a plan you think worthy of consideration — but he’s also the only one whom you can contact without going directly through his Garrison-approved phone.

After you came back, before you were separated, there were parties. Some official, some less. At one of them, Lance’s all family had been there, and in front of everyone was Marco. _Marco_ who was just a couple shades darker than Lance himself, whose eyes were the same blue and whose hair fell long to the small of his back, but whose attitude was so opposite to his younger brother’s, collected and relaxed and so oldest-brother-of-a-bunch-of-jackasses-in-need-of-saving. It had been just a joke of you and Pidge, to ask for Marco’s number in Shiro’s name. Lance’s brother had looked amused at how red and embarrassed the oldest of the Paladins had went, but you knew Shiro enough to realize that, interested or not, he’d probably be relieved to have someone his age to hang out with sometimes as he tried to readjust to life on Earth. 

Then Shiro had been retained for war crimes and you never got the chance to pass the contact along.

Now, you punch the digits in quite angrily.

You don’t do  _people_. Everybody and their mothers know that. That’s why you’re so busy thinking about how to explain your desperate need to contact Lance on a safe line, that you hardly realize someone answered you.

“ _Hello?_ ”

“I need to talk to your brother where the Garrison won’t spy on us.” Yeah, you  _really_ don’t do people.

You try to collect the words to explain yourself better, but Marco doesn’t really give you the time. You hear him call out to someone on the other side of the line. “ _Looks like it’s your bloody lucky day; it’s Keith,_ ” he says, and you don’t know whether to be more surprised that he recognized you or that he’d consider you calling a luck.

Then someone screeches your name; someone who’s not Marco, but not Lance either. 

You blink. “Pidge?"

 

**_We get stuck up inside our heads,_ **  
**_talk shit 'til we're walking dead, talk shit 'til we're walking dead_ **  
**_(dead dead)_ **

“ _Yeah, it’s a long story that we can’t risk talking about on the phone,_ ” she says, and you feel something ache in your chest because of all the others she’s so close yet you’re not allowed to see her and sometimes it hurts so much. A distressed sound escapes you, but she’s nice enough not to mention it. For now. “ _Let’s keep this short, are you still in the desert?_ ” 

“Yeah, but it’s not safe anymore,” you say. “The Garrison broke into my house today, they were searching for something. Pidge, why are you with Marco? What about—"

“ _Yes, yes, I’ll tell Lance you miss him and all that very rivalry, very macho-man stuff of yours, now focus. It’s not just the break-ins: one of the satellites that’s been declared broken down last year has moved four months ago. It’s been watching the coordinates of your cabin ever since._ ” 

The blood in your veins feels sluggish, too thick to properly run and keep you functional and warm. In fact, you feel very much broken and cold, thank for fucking nothing. “Tell Lance I’ll accept an apology letter for calling me a conspiracy theorist.”

Somewhere in the background, you can hear him yell he never did such a thing  _to your face_  so how do you know? It’s almost enough normalcy to make you relax a bit.

“ _Keith, I’ve known you were controlled for months, but I couldn’t risk telling you on the phone. I barely managed to get Lance to come here and it involved so many video-games references I was almost sure he wouldn’t get it. Hunk is here too, he got special permit to come and visit his severely injured uncle._ "

You’re pretty sure you remember Hunk telling you his family had cut all ties with his only American uncle after discovering he’d thrown his daughter out for being a lesbian, but you’re also pretty sure it doesn’t show up on any file of the Garrison’s. For a moment, you wonder if it’s just a lucky coincidence or if Pidge went out of her way to stage an accident for the man. You wouldn’t be surprised.

“So,—” you say instead, because she’s right that you better keep it short, “—I’m the last one?”

“ _You’re quiznacking hard to track, Kogane, you live in the quiznacking desert and your relationship with technology consists mainly on kicking stuff to get it started._ ” Okay, rude. “ _Also, you’re probably the second target on the Garrison’s list. As soon as they’re done with Shiro—"_

“They want his arm,” you say, urgency suddenly back at the front of your mind. “They know it’s Galra, they want to study it." 

“ _And probably replicate it, yeah, we feared that was the case. The only think we don’t know is how they plan on justifying their no-doubt invasive researches._ ”

The radio lays silent besides your feet, but it’s like you can still feel its buzz in your ears. “They’re trying to convict him for treason. For fighting for Lotor.”

“ _… That was his clone, not him._ ”

“I don’t think the Garrison cares. They almost got Shiro to admit it yesterday, with their stupid questions.”

“ _How do you— No, you know what?, I don’t have the time right now._ ” She takes a deep breath and you brace yourself; it’s not going to be good news. “ _Keith, they marked the emergency surgery room in the Garrison as ‘ineligible due to renovations’ three weeks from today._ ”

“A surgery room within the Garrison? Since when?”

“ _Since two years after the failure of the Kerberos mission. Keith, it’s the most advanced they have and it’s far too early for renovations. They’re going to perform something in there._ ”

“Why didn’t they just book it? It’s theirs!”

“ _Because writing **surgical removal of alien prothesis from a non-consenting war veteran**  makes them look like the bad guys if someone comes to check._”

You choke on spit. You’re absolutely frozen now, horror gripping you like a vice claw. Somehow, you miss the fight at the other end of the call until a known male voice shakes you out of it. “ _Okay, time’s almost up, mullet, you can go on a rampage later. If they booked the room, it means they are sure they can convict Shiro within this time and if they get him to the high security cells, we won’t be able to get him out of there on our own._ ”

“Allura and the Blades—“

“ _Count them out, they’ll be our safe base after we leave the atmosphere but you can’t sneak a space-ship on Earth without someone noticing. Also, as aliens they’d be trespassing, which would get us into a pile of quiznack an whole lot deeper._ ”

Somewhere in the back, you hear Pidge mumble  _still not using it right_ , and somehow it makes you feel better. Your team is competent, Pidge knows what she's doing and Lance can be serious when the time asks for it; if you have to be cut out of most of the planning, you wouldn’t want anyone else to entrust the task to. “What should I do?"

“ _I’d say sit still and look pretty, but Hunk has that covered already._ ” Lance sighs. “ _We need to get together so we can get the plan into motion. Where do you think we can come and get you? Somewhere the Garrison probably will have some difficulties following you, so, like, maybe not your house._ ”

Your first thought is obviously Blue’s hiding spot, but you cross that out fast enough. It’s still in the middle of a canyon; just because you managed to barely escape once, it doesn’t mean you can do it again if they see you going there.

“The town,” you say in the end, thinking back to how easily it had been for you to slip through the mass of slow humans after training with the Blades for so long. How good it had been to feel the phantom pressure of eyes on you disappear as you vanished in the crowd. “Give me a spot you can all get to without being noticed and we can meet there.”

**_Why do we care about the rumors, baby?  
Yeah, why do we care about the rumors, baby?_ **

 

People are horrible to converse with, but you have to admit they make for a nice shield. Which sounds pretty ominous and awful, now that you think about it, so you should probably refrain from saying it out loud ever. 

Still, you navigate the crowd changing direction as often as possible while still keeping in mind your destination, and avoiding it.

“ _Do you know the Second Star To The Right?”_ Lance had told you. _"The bar where all cadets who sneak out go to, sooner or later? Or were you too much of a boring person to break the rules for fun?”_

You pointed out that even Shiro knew of the Second Star, and he’d been the golden boy of the Garrison. Lance had laughed as Pidge demanded blackmail material. They said to meet them in there, that it was hidden enough not to make them too visibile but obvious enough that the Garrison wouldn’t think them so stupid to go there for a secret meeting.

As you pointed out already, you’re not sure you trust this reasoning, but, alas, Pidge is your resident genius so you obeyed her. You think turning seventeen or eighteen — you really should keep better track of that — in space with the lot of you’s turned her into a tyrant. You’ve seen her pictures before Kerberos, she could have been a polite nice girl today maybe.

She’d kick your ass if she could hear you, and it makes you smile to yourself.

When you’ve been walking aimlessly for two hours and have bought enough crap to have the bank send your father an e-mail — and so let him know you’re up to something —, you pretend to go the bar for lunch.

Your heart is  _not_ beating hard enough to jump out of your ribcage, don’t be an idiot, that’s not anatomically possible and you know it.

Still.

 

**_Oh, 'cause I don't need to lie to you,_ **  
**_you'll never break my heart._ **  
**_Yeah, you'll find the truth here in my arms,_ **  
**_so, can you tell me why do we care about the rumors, baby?_ **

The first one you see is Hunk, for pure virtue of his height alone. He’s a full head above the rest of the crowd where he stands arms crossed at the counter, lazily propped against it with his back. There’s no trace of his orange headband and his hair have grown longer and stand tied in a ponytail, but the bulk of him, the round shape of his jaw that speaks of loud laughters, the wrinkles around his eyes that you all jokingly blame on his mother-hen tendencies, the dark shade of his skin now even darker after months back at his home… that’s all so inherently Hunk you’re already running before the thought is completely mustered. 

He sees you too, maybe because you’re running, yeah, but you think you can see a suspicious glint in his eyes, so maybe you’re not the only one who’d been holding his breath ever since they split you.

Hunk is huge. Big enough that when you careen into his chest you can bury your face in and hide all the lights, and his shoulders are wide enough that when he wraps his arms around you it’s like he’s encompassing you wholly in his hug, a shield through and through, a human cocoon of protection and warmth. 

God, you missed him so much.

A cool hand joins the two of you just after. You don’t jerk only because Hunk’s heartbeat stays relaxed so whoever’s behind you and running their fingers through your hair has to be someone safe. You have a pretty good idea of who it might be, anyway.

“Sorry, guys,” Lance says indeed, and going back to Cuba for so long revived a bit of accent on his tongue. “Run now, hug later.”

It’s pretty hypocritical of him, considering he’s always the first to snuggle against Hunk at every given chance, but you’ll allow it because, as you very well know and accept, you’re paranoid as quiznack.

“Where to?” you ask, as Hunk takes it upon himself to disentangle your limbs.

Lance grins. “Up."

**_Try to keep an open heart, try to just let down your guard,_ **  
**_don’t— don't care about the rumors, babe._ **

 

Turns out, Lance checked in a hotel in L.A. to keep up the farce of a brotherly bonding trip, but Marco has booked them a room above the Second Star, with their father’s surname so that they won’t get noticed. 

You all know little about Lance’s father, except that the hole he left in the family picture is scarred, burned and still pulses with a faint pain if prodded during the mind-meld exercises, so you know better than to ask more about it. You’re just glad Marco keeps a fake ID with his old surname, from before they all switched to their mother’s.

The room is supposedly for one person, so the fact that there’s six of you in there now shouldn’t be as comfortable as it feels, especially for you. Yet, somehow, it doesn’t feel half bad with Pidge stuck to your left, computer on her knees as she shows you what they have, and Hunk’s chest to your right. Lance commandeered Hunk’s lap but takes sick pleasure in sticking his stupid legs over yours and Pidge’s, toeing the PC just enough to make her swat at him. Marco and Matt, silent wall of oldest siblings, watch over you from their positions, the first sitting at the windowsill to check the street and the other in front of the door. 

You don’t feel boxed in, but you feel, achingly clearly, the lack of one more body in your dog-pile of cuddles.

Hunk’s arm sneaks around your head to drape on your shoulders, and squeezes. “We’re getting him back.”

You believe him. He’s on your team, after all.

_**Get out of the gossip game, get out of the haterade,** _  
_**don’t— don't care about— don't care about—** _  
_**don't care about the rumors.** _

Love used to be a word you walk the long way around, before. In its every acceptation, it sounded like a fraud out to skim you, like a trap ready to open under your feet and swallow you whole. Your father loved you the way a military man with a huge secret could, like a parent trying to hide you from the world; it was real, but it almost chocked you one too many times, and it taught you diffidence much more than affection. If you were to point out the person who pulled you back to the concept, that would be Shiro.

Shiro with black hair, Shiro with taunts that worked far too well in pushing you to do better and study more, Shiro with a hand on your shoulder and the other pointing at the depths of the sky.  _And wouldn’t you know?, maybe one day we’ll be up there together on a mission!_ You wonder if he remembers those words, if he regrets them.

Shiro opened the dam and the Paladins took it down and the Blades cleaned the path for your mother to walk back in. And now you’re not sure you’re willing to make do without any of them. 

The Balmeran crystal in your hand feels much heavier than it actually is, you’re very well aware, but that doesn’t stop your fingers from clenching around it, refusing to simply let it dangle from the leather bracelet around your wrist. You’ll let it go once you’re inside the Garrison, you promise, but now you just… need the comfort. You’d rather have Hunk or the others or Shiro or your mom, but, meh. You’ll have to be happy with this.

You’re not happy. You’re quiznacking nervous.

You and your father stay inside the shack, but you watch from the window as your mother makes a dash for it, head and body covered tightly with dark cloths. It reminds you a bit too much of your trial with the Blades, you can even hear the bombs going off in the back of your head and you jerk at ever imaginary blast.

Your dad touches your shoulders with an hesitant hand. “They won’t find her if she doesn’t want them to,” he reassures and you nod.

The Blue Lion’s nest is a safe place where most human technology won’t work, while your mother’s Galran senses and Pidge’s cloaking device are unaffected. They won’t find her, and they’ll come for you with questions. And you’ll be ready for them, because you always are.

Your mother will be on stand-by as you do your thing as a Paladin, which is saving people and protecting the universe. And Shiro is people and humans with Galra technology is a bad idea even in the best case scenario.

Your mom disappears in the desert. You count numbers in your head, and it takes you far too long to realize you’re counting ticks rather than seconds.

You reach two-hundred-thirty-seven and two hover-quads show up at your door, their riders in full Garrison gear.

 

**_(Don't care about, don't care about)_ **  
**_Rumors, rumors, don't care about the rumors._ **

It’s weird to look at Iverson’s face and know you’re the one who damaged his eye. You look inside your chest and look for some kind of remorse, but you can’t find any. It probably has something to do with the fact that you’re handcuffed, there are two officers easily one-point-five your height and twice your built holding you by the arms, and your retinas are forever imprinted with the picture of a soldier slamming their rifle’s butt against your father’s temple to knock him out.

You’ve got curses on your lips that would make Kolivan cringe and Allura gasp in shock, but their meaning would be lost on these humans so you keep them for yourself.

(When did you start thinking about humans as  _them_?)

You think,  _Shiro_. You clutch the Balmeran crystal in your palm.

Iverson is not asking questions, his eyes say he knows very well how big his chances of you answering are. Good, it’s nice to be on the same page. He sighs at your glare as if dealing with an unruly child, and you swear that you’ll prove to him just how wrong he is. Later. After you’re done with your mission.

How do you miss your old comms. Even just a stupid joke from Lance or an unintelligible string of datas from Pidge would be nice; heck, you’d take even Allura’s scolding or Hunk’s panicked yells, right now.

Iverson pushes a button on his desk. “Take prisoner Shirogane to my office,” he calls in the inter-phone, and it confuses you just a bit. Is he really that stupid?

The soldiers pull you roughly to a side, and for the next few minutes Iverson studies you. “He’d confess to murdering Kennedy if I told him you’re in troubles, you know that, don’t you?” 

You know. You don’t care because Shiro is not going to stay here long enough to say one incriminating word.

Your silence must be annoying, to your old instructor. It sure was when you were training here, so you resort to it.

You wait.

**_Why do we care about the rumors, baby?  
Yeah, why do we care about the rumors, baby?_**

 

Shiro looks healthy enough, which is the only reason you don’t go on a rampage the moment he’s dragged inside the room. His metal and flesh wrists are tied together in front of his groin and to a belt around his waist, and the chain holding them falls to his ankles to restrict them too, just enough to make it impossible to run but not enough to impede walk on his own. He’s wearing grey coveralls and a haunted look. You wonder how many flashbacks he’s had since he’d been here. 

Exhausted as he may be, his eyes fall on you and widen. His stance shifts immediately, from meek compliance to the straightness of indignation, shoulders squared and teeth bared. “What is he doing here?!” His chains tingle when he pulls forward.

Iverson doesn’t seem threatened. You don’t think him stupid enough to underestimate the strength of the metal arm, so you assume it’s been deactivated somehow. Indeed, you think with a second discreet look, it hangs limp from Shiro’s shoulder, its movements mostly a result of being bound to the flesh limb. 

Bloody quiznackers.

The soldiers in charge of Shiro seem much less relaxed than their Commander, and they pull their prisoner back with little gentleness. The Balmeran crystal slowly warms up in your hand. 

“Mr Kogane here is suspected of hosting hostile alien lifeforms,” Iverson says.

It takes all your restrain not to growl at him. “Not all Galra are hostile!”

You can see the gears moving in Shiro’s head, pieces shift to fit the new picture, plans forming with the single goal of getting his teammate out of here. You also see the moment in which his shoulders slump, his gaze goes clouded and he willing, consciously, plays himself into Iverson’s web.

“I—“ You don’t let him say anything more.

The crystal burns your skin and you shed most of it with a roar from your chest.

 

**_Oh, 'cause I don't need to lie to you,_**  
**_you'll never break my heart._**  
**_Yeah, you'll find the truth here in my arms._ **

“ _Holy quiznack, dude! Holy quiznack!”_

_“Can’t you use that bloody word right **once** , Lance?!”_

_“Guys, not to pressure you or anything, but what about we **talk about that later, oh quiznack, they’re shooting at us! They’re shooting at us!** ”_

You wonder how could you miss this mess, seriously. Your nerves must have been bad.

Shiro is like a luggage you’re hauling around. He’s silent, he looks lost, and he follows meekly where you pull him by the metal arm. He’s been like that ever since you snapped his chains with your bare hands.

If you didn’t know better after Ulaz and Thace and the Blades, you’d be worried looking at you might have sent him someplace bad in his memory. As of now, you both know better than to let a few physical traits to be a trigger; it’s probably just the shock of having you taller than him that’s broken his human psyche for a second. 

(You should really stop thinking about humans as  _them_. It’s a bit hard to do right now, though.)

The Garrison will have some cover-up work to do after today. You wonder how they’d explain a purple-furred beast manhandling Officer Shirogane around the base, if the tape were ever to be leaked. It makes you bare your fangs in an amused grin that you’re seventy-percent sure you picked from Pidge. 

“Keith?”

You turn. Shiro is looking at you and blinking far too often for comfort. Your grin widens again. “Close your mouth, Shiro. Flies are gonna get in.”

You pull him flush to you as you jump through a window, the glass shards failing to cut your thick skin now and the drop from the third floor somehow unable to do more than rattling your teeth a bit as you land on your feet but with your mouth open.

There’s laser blasts opening a hole in the electrified fence around the Garrison and guarding the black shape of a pod levitating barely a few inches from ground. Your legs are faster than humans’ now so you don’t let Shiro go as you run in that direction.

He lets out a distressed sound when he recognizes the figures, but you have no time to waste listening to his lecture, and just sprint faster.

 

**_So can you tell me why do we care about the rumors, baby?_ **

White lasers take down another portion of wall to broaden the hole enough to let you through. A guard almost gets you with a taser, but a bullseye shot slams the thing out of the human’s hand enough to give you the time to slap them a few meters away. A green lazo ties up against the fence and the flow of electricity runs through it to the pod, powering it up even more.

You pass Lance and Hunk on your way to the pod and they keep shooting to cover your retreat; you let Pidge help you haul Shiro inside as he starts on his unavoidable rant; you listen to your mother yelling back and fort on a croaky connection with who might be a cheery Allura or maybe Coran in full panic.

Trusting people to have your back is not your strongest suit, but you’re learning.

The Balmeran crystal dangles from your wrist, sparklingly lightly.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not ill anymore, but I can still do what I want so have Keith's dad being alive and well, you're welcome.
> 
> Also, Keith grew up and knows better than to jump recklessly into battle now, YES, CHARACTER GROWTH IS A THING here. Still doesn't mean he wouldn't go Full Galra on Iverson to get Shiro back, come on, that'd be plain OOC.
> 
> Also also, have I accidentally created a ship that's Shiro and Lance's brother Marco? Yes. Yes, I did. I'm a disaster.
> 
> Come talk with me _@agapantoblu.tumblr.com_ , but keep in mind I'm a tiny thing that hates discourse so, really, haters can stick to the left and pass me by and I'll wave at them as they disappear into the sun.


End file.
